After She Died has a mind-blowing concept but is unfortunately lackluster in almost every other area.
After She Died Review
Directed by Jack Dignan, After She Died follows a teenage girl when her life is changing quickly due to her graduating high school. In the midst of all of this, her dad has a new girlfriend that looks identical to her late mother.
That is all we will say without giving any spoilers away because though on the surface this seems like a pretty basic indie horror film, the concepts behind the film outdo themselves. The film gets not only gruesomely horrifying but also fantastical in a sense we didn’t see coming.
Sadly the acting is where this movie begins to fall apart. We are introduced to this girl and her whole life but none of it is truly that engaging until we get to the not so subtle hints of what is actually going on. Those hints are what kept it interesting but for the first half of the runtime this was a tough one to get through.
Even the phenomenal performance from Vanessa Madrid as the mother can’t save the unnecessarily slow and dragged out first half.
With that being said, Vanessa Madrid also makes the second half as perfect as it is. Not only is the concept absolutely insane – but the acting is on a whole other level. Maybe it is because they had more room to go crazy but it seemed like everything was at its peak in the back end of the film. Many might say, “a crazy final act isn’t made without the first half of great setup” but this movie disagrees.
There are good moments in the first half, but those all end up being the high concept ideas being teased, showing that all of the exposition and character building is uninteresting and never actually pays off.
Those things aside, After She Died was made for only 300,000 USD and shot during the pandemic, but you probably couldn’t tell that just from watching. The production design is amazing and they are not shy with horror ideas. The filmmakers went all in, story and set wise. Tons of blood and gore enhances this fairly mediocre story but also makes the wild concepts so much better.
The cinematography is also phenomenal. There are a lot of classic horror camera movements but also the storytelling with color is something I didn’t expect to be this great. The cold and warm colors paired with dark themes make everything (conceptually and visually) come together so well.
At the end of the day, After She Died is a good watch for the concept alone but if you really love horror, you might like this one all the way through.